Invincible is a well-known and popular superhero comic series that has become particularly famous all over the world thanks to the arrival of an animated series published on Amazon Prime who was able to talk a lot about himself. Unfortunately though, it just looks like that Robert Kirkman, creator ofInvincible, suddenly found himself in big legal trouble, stemming from an artist suing the man.
Going into more detail, Robert Kirkman was sued by a cartoonist who claims he was tricked into giving up his copyrights. William Crabtree in fact claimed to have co-created Invincible (he was the comic’s colorist for its first 50 issues), but was persuaded by Kirkman to divest his ownership of the title in 2005 to make it easier to sell the rights to the studios. The lawyer Devin McRae he has declared:
Fraud and deception have become standard business practice for Kirkman and this is apparently where his true creative attitude resides.
Crabtree claims he had a verbal deal with Kirkman that guaranteed him 20 percent of the proceeds from the sale of Invincible, as well as 10 percent of all revenue from other films or the commercial exploitation of the work. In practice, having given up its copyrights, Crabtree has not received a single cent from the success of the television work.
As for why this deal was never written, Crabtree argues that Kirkman allegedly convinced him to sign a “Certificate of Paternity” for his rights to the work while he was at San Diego Comic Con in 2005.
The lawsuit specifies that Kirkman continued to pay Crabtree for sales of the comics, as well as for the license granted to MTV for an animated series and Paramount Pictures to make possible films and television series. Yet when Invincible was handed over to Amazon Studios, Kirkman refused his payment requests. For now it is difficult to predict what will happen to Kirkman and at the moment we can not help but wait, hoping that the lawsuit does not affect the future of Invincible.
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